


ceiling fans and idle hands will take my life (again)

by orphan_account



Series: redemption's not that far and darkness is going down [4]
Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Depression, Future Fic, Gen, Lack of Communication, M/M, actual dialogue and plot!, seriously if these two would be /honest/ with each other, this is heading towards ship stuff fyi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-01
Updated: 2015-07-01
Packaged: 2018-04-07 03:26:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4247562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tours end, and so do other things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ceiling fans and idle hands will take my life (again)

**Author's Note:**

> The least id-ficcy I've been thus far! This was mostly born out of my morbid curiosity about how Tyler and Josh will deal with life after this next tour. Title from 'Glowing Eyes'. It should be noted that:  
> a) all I know about Ohio winters is what I just pulled off of Google, and the interview where Tyler talks about seasonal depression.  
> b) I don't know when the tour ends so the timeline is completely imaginary.  
> c) I should edit this stuff before I put it up, but I don't. Sorry about that.  
> d) Tyler is, for the purposes of this fic, not married/dating/doing much besides being sucked into a black hole of his own misery. Very sad.

Tyler didn’t expect Josh to forget him once he properly moved into his house in LA. He’s pretty confident that Josh won’t forget him until he’s 80 and his mind is frayed, if ever.  
  
But he had a tiny seed of fear that had sprouted up and settled down roots as the Blurryface tour wound down. A fear seedling that said 'what if he replaces you?’  
  
It sounds ridiculous when he actually takes the time to think about it. But when he thinks about it more, it sounds less ridiculous. After all, Josh had had a best friend before he met Tyler. Tyler assumes he did, anyway. What happened to that guy after Josh and Tyler had met?  
  
Tyler knows that he should just tell Josh about this. He’s just not sure how to word it. _I’m afraid you’re going to find cooler friends in LA that play the piano better and don’t need as much help, and gradually you’ll stop answering my phone calls and we’ll drift apart until the label wants a new album?_  
  
Yeah, that probably wouldn’t be a good way to put it.  
  
—  
  
Josh loves touring, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t looking forward to actually spending more than a few weeks in LA. Touring is planes, buses, music, and Tyler non-stop for months. He loves all of it (some parts more than others), but he has a living room to decorate and a city to explore.  
  
He’s gonna miss Tyler, though. They’ve talked about how to keep working on music with 3000 miles separating them, but Josh knows that Tyler will probably go silent on him for days at a time when he’s writing new songs. It worries him that he won’t be able to make sure it’s writing-silence, not depressed-silence. He resolves to spend their next flight thinking about how to make a long-distance version of the ‘four calls’ rule.  
  
—  
  
They take different flights home after the very last show. Tyler to Columbus on a red-eye, Josh on an 8 pm flight to Los Angeles. It’s not great.  
  
Josh holds on to Tyler tightly before getting on his flight. Tyler is pretty sure that this is going to go on twitter but he doesn’t particularly care. Not when Josh has his arms wrapped around Tyler, one hand grasping his shoulder.  
  
“I’ll call you when I get in safe,” he says into Tyler’s ear. “Call me if anything happens, okay?”  
  
“Things don’t happen to me, I happen to them,” Tyler says, blinking suspiciously rapidly. “Get going, you’re gonna miss your flight.”  
  
“Yeah yeah,” Josh says, pulling back to look Tyler in the eyes. “Love you, buddy. This was a good one.”  
  
“Yeah, it was.” Tyler says, smiling. He waves at Josh until he’s too far up the boarding line, because they’re best friends and infamous dorks, so it’s okay.  
  
He’s okay.  
  
—  
  
He stays okay all the way through the flight. As soon as the plane touches down his phone is out, and he and Josh talk all the way through baggage claim, until Tyler sees his mom’s car driving towards his terminal.  
  
It’s dumb stuff; Josh tells him about the guy on his flight who drank five cups of orange juice and made the flight attendant wait there to pour him a new one after every cup. Tyler tells him about the kids pretend-lightsaber fighting in the airport restaurant he ate at. It’s the stuff that they would usually experience together, but he guesses experiencing it apart isn’t too bad. He is a little sad that he and Josh could make judgey faces at each other while that guy drank his orange juice, though.  
  
—  
  
Unpacking after a tour is its own level of hell, Josh decides. He thinks about tweeting that, but texts it to Tyler instead. And then calls him immediately afterwards, just so he can say it.  
  
“I know,” Tyler groans through the phone speaker. “Dude, I think I lost all of my socks. I didn’t bring that many to begin with, but. They’re all gone now.”  
  
“Right?” Josh says, sorting through his own scant laundry. “I’m pretty sure some of my jeans went missing.”  
  
“Not that it matters, all of your jeans look the same,” Tyler says, laughing.  
  
It’s true, but Josh is obviously honor-bound to defend his clothing choices, and before he knows it he’s abandoned his bags and is lying on his unmade bed, smiling into the phone as Tyler extolls the virtues of floral print to him.  
  
—  
  
Columbus is nice in its own way, like always. Tyler can feel autumn chill and the still faint promise of winter in the air, and it’s almost comforting, to recognize that old herald of the quietness that will soon overtake him.  
  
He doesn’t quite like the idea of going through it without Josh. Last year they technically didn’t live in the same city, but they were together recording a lot of the time. So it didn’t matter too much.  
  
This year, Josh is still talking about how he’s learning how to surf while Tyler’s mom bugs him to buy a snow shovel.  
  
It’s not necessarily bad, but it’s weird.  
  
—  
  
Josh loves LA. He loves the sun, the ocean, and the openness of everything outside of the city. The traffic is only a little worse than it is in Columbus, and the food is probably better. Really, the only thing that isn’t as good is the lack of Tyler.  
  
He’s made friends, for sure. LA is crawling with every type of person, and he’s invited into a number of circles before a week is up in his new home. But he still misses that close intimacy he has with Tyler, and their phone calls and texts and skype sessions can’t quite make up for it.  
  
As what passes for an LA winter begins to approach, Josh’s thoughts turn more and more towards Columbus. Those long, dark winters are all he knew until now, but at least he and Tyler knew them together. Now, he feels a little like he’s abandoned his friend.  
  
Tyler’s doing well, though. It seems like he is, and Josh knows him better than almost anyone. He seems like he’s doing well.  
  
—  
  
If a stranger were to walk up to Tyler and ask him how his life is, he’d probably spill everything. _It’s as great as life can be when depression is trying to take over and my best friend is gone. It’s so good. You should try it._  
  
But strangers aren’t asking him, Josh is. So Tyler says _it’s good_. He says _listen to this new song_. He says _buy any new jeans yet?_ Because Josh is his best friend, and Tyler will be damned before he drags Josh back to somewhere he doesn’t want to be. He’s done enough dragging down already, more would be beyond his ‘depressed action’ quota for the year.  
  
And he is writing, that’s no placating lie. His journals are filled with words about escape and abandonment and the guilt he feels suffocated by lately. He writes a lot of stupid questions down and scribbles over them with a pen.  
  
Things like _was I the reason you left? Are you going to come back? If you did, would it be for me or because of me?_  
  
Questions like that are better left illegible under thick ink.  
  
Tyler himself is better left in the encroaching darkness. He just wishes that Josh were here with him.  
  
No, he doesn’t wish that. Josh doesn’t belong in the dark, he belongs in the sun. Tyler wishes he could want that too, but lately it feels like all he can want is to not be alone. And it’s true, he is better here. His writing is better; his songs are all conceived in the cold winters and hatched in the spring, when his piano and Josh’s drums feel like more than some animal protest against the snow and silence.  
  
So if he is better where he is, and Josh is better where he is, and Tyler knows all of this, then why does he still want? It’s the question of self-control that plagues him, always, and like every winter he finds himself loathing that part of him that still hurts and wants. Why can’t he be over it?  
  
_Why can’t he be with Josh?_  
  



End file.
